The present disclosure relates to an automotive door-hole-sealing material for sealing, for example, an opening formed on an inner panel of an automotive door. In particular, the present disclosure belongs to a technical field of a structure which allows the automotive door-hole-sealing material to be attached to an inner panel of the automotive door having a protrusion protruding from the opening on the inner panel in an inward-outward direction of a passenger compartment.
An inner panel of an automotive door has, for example, a work opening for securing various parts inside the door and an opening for installing a speaker. To cover these openings, a door-hole-sealing material is attached to the inner panel.
Known examples of door-hole-sealing materials in this kind include materials disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2005-47377 and Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2007-290668. The door-hole-sealing material in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2005-47377 is a resin sheet. A circumferential edge of the resin sheet is provided with an adhesive portion to an inner panel. This adhesive portion is formed stepwise to bulge with respect to other portions of the resin sheet. The adhesive portion is also formed thinner than the other portions.
Moreover, the door-hole-sealing material in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2007-290668 includes a core layer containing an elastic material and a non-elastic skin layer provided to each face of the core layer. A resin film included in the skin layer is stretched until the resin film exceeds its elastic deformation limit, and plastically deformed.
An automotive door may be provided with an impact absorbing member for reducing a side impact to be applied on a passenger when a car is in a side impact collision. This impact absorbing member needs to have a predetermined size or larger in width direction of the car to achieve an impact absorption effect. Hence, the impact absorbing member can be provided to protrude from an interior face of the door close to passenger compartment through an opening on the inner panel to the inside of the door.
Here, as Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2005-47377 discloses, for example, a portion of a door-hole-sealing material may bulge to conform to the impact absorbing member so that high interference between the door-hole-sealing material and the impact absorbing member may be alleviated.
However, the door-hole-sealing material in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2005-47377 contains a resin sheet. This resin sheet could be a cause of noise generated when the door-hole-sealing material makes contact with the impact absorbing member by, for example, the vibrations of a running car. Moreover, the resin sheet in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2005-47377 is solid, and thus low in sound absorption effect. Hence, the door-hole-sealing material may contribute little to improvement in quietness in the passenger compartment. Furthermore, there is another problem: since the bulging portion of the door-hole-sealing material becomes thin, noise out of the passenger compartment easily passes through the thin bulging portion.
To overcome the problems, a door-hole-sealing material in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2007-290668 may be used in a manner that a portion of the door-hole-sealing material is stretched to alleviate high interference between the door-hole-sealing material and an impact absorbing member. However, a skin layer in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2007-290668 is not elastic, and could be a cause of noise generated when making contact with an impact absorbing member by, for example, the vibrations of a running car as seen in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2005-47377. Moreover, in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2007-290668, the skin layer is provided to each face of the core layer, and thus insufficient in sound absorption effect. Furthermore, the skin layer is stretched until exceeding its elastic deformation limit, and becomes thin. The core layer also becomes thin because it is deformed in conformity with the impact absorbing member. Specifically, the door-hole-sealing material in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2007-290668 also has a problem that noise out of the passenger compartment easily passes through the material.
The present disclosure is conceived in view of the above problems. When a protrusion is provided to protrude from an opening on an inner panel of a door in an inward-outward direction of a passenger compartment, the present disclosure attempts to alleviate high interference with the protrusion, reduce noise generated by contact with the protrusion, and improve quietness inside the passenger compartment with high noise absorption performance and noise insulating effect.